Page:An English Garner Ingatherings from Our History and Literature (Volume 1 1877).pdf/173

So, though the Angler have good store of tools,
And them with skill in finest sort can frame;
Yet when he comes to rivers, lakes and pools,
If that he know not how to use the same,
And with what baits to make the fishes fools;
He may go home as wise as out he came,
  And of his coming boast himself as well
  As he that from his father's chariot fell.

Not that I take upon me to impart
More than by others hath before been told,
Or that the hidden secrets of this Art
I would unto the vulgar sort unfold;
Who peradventure for my pains' desert
Would count me worthy BALAAM'S horse to hold:
  But only to the willing learner show
  So much thereof as may suffice to know.

But here, O NEPTUNE! that with triple mace
Dost rule the raging of the ocean wide;
I meddle not with thy deformèd race
Of monsters huge, that in those waves abide;
With that great whale, that by three whole days' space
The man of GOD did in his belly hide,
  And cast him out upon the Euxine shore
  As safe and sound as he had been before.

Nor with that Ork, that on Cephæan strand
Would have devoured ANDROMEDA the fair;
Whom PERSEUS slew with strong and valiant hand,
Delivering her from danger and despair:
The Hurlepool [? whirlpool] huge that higher than the land
Whole streams of water spouteth in the air;
  The porpoise large that playing swims on high
  Portending storms or other tempest nigh.